


Hazardous to Your Health

by taibhrigh



Category: Space: Above and Beyond
Genre: Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-10
Updated: 2010-09-10
Packaged: 2017-10-11 15:40:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/113983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taibhrigh/pseuds/taibhrigh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>an injury sends Cooper to a triage center</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hazardous to Your Health

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: sedate (#115) [at LJ's writers_choice]

"No!" Cooper screamed. "No, pain meds. You can't sedate me!" The brown-haired soldier looked wildly around the makeshift triage area for a familiar face. "Nathan, tell them they can't use that on me," he begged his friend. His voice more scared than pained by the shrapnel embedded in his leg.

Nathan dodged between orderlies and other patients and grabbed the nurse's hand before she could administer anything to his squad mate.

"Let me go, soldier," the nurse demanded. "He gets the regular meds until we can get to him." She quieted her voice, trying to get the soldiers to understand. "It'll help keep him calm and from moving around."

Nathan didn't let her arm go. "He's an Invitro," Nathan said, moving the nurse's hand away. "You can't give him the general pain stuff. Maybe you should talk to your patients before doping them." The last was said through clenched teeth.

"Look," the nurse started to say.

"No, you look," Nathan interrupted, "get a doctor over here and then we'll see."

The nurse turned on her heel and stormed off. Nathan and Cooper both relaxed with a sigh. "Thanks," Cooper mumbled laying his head back down on the gurney.

Nathan grunted. "Next time, just stay undercover and we won't have to be here."

"Seems to me," Cooper said, slanting his eyes to look at Nathan, "that I wouldn't be here if you had followed that advice."

"Probably."

This time Cooper grunted. "Med staff two o'clock," he warned.

Nathan's posture straightened and he glared at the approaching threesome. "What seems to be the problem here, Captain?" the new woman asked him, voice tense and sounding like she'd call the MPs in a heartbeat.

Nathan took a moment to glance over the other woman. Her nametag marked her as a doctor, the rank insignia as military. "Your nurse," he said, bluntly, "was going to administer the general pain shit to Captain Hawkes without asking him or checking his files."

"It's standard..."

Nathan didn't even let her get two words in, having heard the standards crap before. "Perhaps you should check his dog tags. Unless of course you're in the habit of creating junkies or madmen."

The doctor turned to look at Cooper who had propped himself up on his elbows to watch the battle between his friend and the doctor. "You're an Invitro?"

"That's what I was trying to tell her," Cooper answered, trying not to roll his eyes.

"How's the pain?"

"On a scale of one to ten, about a three--so long as I don't move the leg and no one bumps into it. I wouldn't mind having the shrapnel removed," he added.

The doctor nodded, looking over the wounds. "X-ray, clean, stitch, wrap," she ordered the new nurse. "Stick to the over the container pain meds should he need something. And, I'll want to look it over before you wrap it." Her only acknowledgement of Cooper or Nathan after that was a "gentlemen" before she marched off toward another area and patient with the first nurse following.

Nathan and Cooper exchanged looks before they both shrugged. "Never easy with you around," Nathan said, smiling.

Cooper snorted. "Like you'd have it any other way," he told Nathan before protesting the nurse's actions with a "hey, that stings."

"Probably not," Nathan said with a smile and shake of his head.


End file.
